Heading to Bend today for the weekend. Will be climbing South Sister again this year with my doc. Robby, my partner is coming, so that's an extra treat.
It's a long 5000 vertical foot slog to the summit. But the view north is worth is. You can see Middle Sister, North Sister, 3-fingered Jack, Jefferson, Hood, etc. I think you might be able to get a glimpse of Mt. Rainier way off there.

And there comes my next (questionable) adventure. One Monday, I meet up with Robin to take 9 days to backpack around the Mt Rainer. It's over 93 miles, and probably over 25,000 vertical feet. It's will be grueling, with no break days, and I wonder about my stamina, and the logistics.

My Health is good, except for some lingering "feverishness" after Africa. I took a couple of courses of antibiotics to get over a bad case of diarrhea, but think that is solved. I think one reason I do this to disprove to myself (and to the world) that I am not fragile. That I can push myself to the limit.
But I also know the reality of having AIDS, and it's complications. At least 2 pounds of my weight on the trek will be meds. My biggest concern is the fuzeon, which involves mixing, and twice daily injections, all in sanitary conditions that are less than optimal.
I haven't talked about my latest numbers in awhile. I'm still undetectable, after a minor blip last fall. I know the studies say that as long as I am adherent to my meds, that should remain so. I rarely miss a dose, maybe a small screwup every 3-4 months. But I do wonder what factors having diarrhea for a week plays. My CD4 count has slowly risen to about 475. Good, but my CD4 percentage is only 13% (pretty bad), which according to some docs, is borderline full-blown AIDS, and puts me at a much higher risk for opportunistic infections. I want to believe I can't live my life according to lab tests, but I can't ignore them either.

So here I cam heading off. Sometimes - 20 miles or so from the nearest road, and logistical problems of being halfway around a mountain if something should happen, and I should need to bail out.
My main goal is not to affect my health over the long term.
Planning, Endurance, and Faith.

After coming back from Cape Town, many impressions of the city and the country. A place of inequities, despair, but of unimaginable beauty and hope. It made me realize how a country can walk the chasm between possibility and ruin. It made me further appreciate the great role that Nelson Mandela has played in the country, and how he is one of the great leaders of the past 25 years.
The Sunday after returning, a choir at my church sung "Lamentations of Jeremiah". Many people around me were crying. I was crying too, perhaps from the raw earthiness of awareness from where I had just come: